Twin-Seal: Forbidden Era

When I was born, here in Lativa, I already knew my lot in life. A fixed destination with a static path to get there.

Tilling the Lands, tending to the animals that grazed them. Like my family had done for centuries past. It wasn't a grand life, but it fed my family and allowed us a happiness away from the bustle of the cities and towns that surrounded the Dawning Plains. I was grateful, as was my wife, Maria. 

But, as I came to find, our happiness had much more room to grow.

I remember the sounds and sights of childbirth all too clear. It was a force of nature, and impressed upon me the imperial strength my Wife possessed to be able to endure such a beautiful ritual. I remember the indentation of our son in my arms, his greyish plumes of infantile hair sprouting with a youthful glow atop his head. 

"Look at him, Damian. Our baby boy." My wife cooed as she held our son in her spindly arms, her energy all but depleted after the transformative act. 

I couldn't contain the joy I felt in that moment. The urge to give my all for this child I would come to know and grow alongside. 

"What should we name him?" She asked, cuddling besides me as we fawned over the infant that sprung to life in our arms.

There were many possibilities we had thought of. We could name him after my father, as he did for me. Or Maria's. But deep within me, one singular choice became clearer than all the rest.

"Yovin. He shall be the strength that will lead our family to greatness." I answered, a new sensation growing inside me as I ruminated on the possibilities that awaited us. 

"Yovin, huh? It's perfect, my love. Little Yovi." My wife was enamored with the boy, as was I. But their relationship was leaps and bounds ahead of what I had been accustomed to by my own parents, and hers as well, I'm sure. This child was special. In a way we couldn't grasp or place. But that feeling was legitimate. And we would raise him as such. 

Mornings filled with a hectic new routine, our bearings completely discombobulated as we grew acquainted with what it meant to raise an infant. Nights filled with stories and inward reflections as our child's presence in our lives grew larger by the day. 

That was what it meant to have a child. As a boy, I was always curious as to how I would react to my first. Would I be scared for their future? Or would the weight of such a responsibility leave me awestruck? Neither ended up being the case. All I felt was love, as did my wife, as we gave our all to raise and nurture him to the best of our abilities. 

The first signs of his true nature came to pass when he was 5. 

Rounding the last of the Cattle from their grazing fields, my Wife rushed towards me with a look of excitement as I toiled away at this year's bountiful harvest. Many people would benefit from our stock, and that fact made the gruesome work at least a little bit more manageable. 

"Damian, Damian, come here!" She called, waving her hands in the air like a child furiously drawing their parent's attention. Leaving my tools where they were, I scrambled towards her, eager to learn what was behind her haste. 

"What is it, my love?"

"It's Yovin! He... He blew a tree down!" 

The words she spoke didn't properly situate themselves within my head until she led me to the turf leading up to our Home. As I noticed the large oak trunk of our ancient growth haphazardly blown into chunks on our front lawn, I felt panic grow inside me.

"Is Yovin alright? Where is he?" I grabbed my wife by her shoulders, earning an alarmed look in response, to which she calmly removed them and stepped away.

"Yovin is perfectly fine. I have him in our study for right now. But look! One second he was playing, and then the next, boom!" Her eyes were filled with a mystical intrigue I was too worried to share in. Not bothering to ask anymore questions, I rushed inside the house, looking for our son with hysterical energy that surprised even me. 

Finding him exactly where Maria had said, I took him into my arms and held him close. He was much larger than when he was just a baby, almost 4 feet in height, but the strength that came with my anxiety masked his size all too well. 

"Papa, what's wrong? I'm sorry about our Tree. I just got excited." Yovin asked, his face cocked adorably to one side as he looked for recognition in my eyes. Setting him down, I kneeled to meet his expression.

"Nothing son. And no, I'm not mad. As long as you're safe. But, how did you knock it down? Were you playing?"

"Yeah! There was a Cockateel in one of the branches, and when I tried to reach for it, this funny looking light came out of my hands, and then the Tree went all over the place!" His face lit up with excitement as he recalled the details, dashing my own anxiety away as I ruminated on what this could mean for our family. 

That night, me and Maria had a conversation regarding both our son and our futures. 

"It's like what happened with my Uncle. He came to the power at around the same age as Yovin, but it wasn't anywhere near potent enough to disintegrate an entire Oak like that." Maria pondered, sitting lazily on our sofa alongside me as we watched the rising and falling of our son's sleeping figure. 

"To be fair, your uncle never reached that level, right? He ended up inheriting your father's business. Not like he would need the Power as a Tanner." I worked the confusion I felt through my tired jaw, moving it around as I postulated Maria's anecdote. There wasn't a precedent like this in our family, or any other Arlean family I could bring to mind.

"That's true. I wonder if we should take him to a specialist. He could end up being a Chromalist, or even a Stentor, right?" 

I took my Wife's meaning with a heavy heart. In this world, our kind were seen as lesser than the other sentient races. She knew that all to well. But in Lativa, Arleans were held in safe harbor against our enemies, at least in theory. And while that safety had been upheld for centuries up until this point, the idea of sending our Child off to some unknown individual with motives completely against our own... It was a humbling thought.

"I don't know, Maria. Obviously were out of our depths when it comes to this sort of thing, but he is much to young to be given that level of freedom. Especially in this day and age."

My wife, who knew my worries all too well, shared them just as I had in fact, looked at me with a knowing glance. One I had seen far too many times to not see what was coming.

"It's wonderful though, isn't it? He'll have access to so many opportunities, so much more than you or I had growing up. All we need to do is nurture his power until the time is right." She rested against my side as she spoke, a visage of fatigue wearing away her pretty features. I coaxed her oxen hair as she slowly drifted to sleep, leaving me alone with the prospects of our family's future. 

Weeks passed, and as we learned more and more of the scope of our Son's abilities, the idea of giving him a formal education in the ways we were clueless in grew heavier in our minds. We didn't have an endless supply of trees Yovin could batter as he practiced the art of Chroma, but the autonomy of his power gave way to many other means of supplementation. 

It wasn't just a means of violence, as I had originally thought. One day, as I had finished my work on the fields, similar to the first signs of Yovin's burgeoning identity as a Chromalist, Maria came to me with just as much excitement as she did when our son brutalized the Family tree that rested on our property for eons by that point.

As we gathered inside our home, I took notice of Yovin's closed eyes, deep in a transcendental sleep as lights of all colors and intensities floated around him. A tiny Galaxy floating above our son's resting figure that imprinted the beauty such power could exhibit to me and Maria. 

In that moment, I made a solemn vow to myself, betraying the path my Forefathers have set for me and my family since our founding. Our son would be greater than us, greater than the entirety of our lineage. It was a belief I had become aware of as soon as he was born, but seeing such an arterial sight before me, I couldn't help but find that ideal assert itself in my mind once again.

Through the years, his exhibitions became more and more pronounced. What started as innocent breaches into the unknown turned into a constant fixation. And with every work of art Yovin manipulated with Chroma, every showing of strength, my resolve hardened. 

What is the point of being a parent, being a father, if you can't engage with the gifts your child is blessed with? And these weren't ordinary gifts by any stretch of the imagination. Yovin had the ability to weave reality itself to his whims. Just like the constellations he forms when asleep, the impossible became real through him. It was why I felt so strongly that he needed to spread his wings. 

The thought scared me, though. Bringing it up to Maria would end in her immediate dismissal. He was only 10, after all. He had a few years at least until the idea would ruminate in his own mind, as it did mine when I had come of age. To leave the nest. It saddened me just by thinking about it. The boy I had grown to love and respect would, in the blink of an eye, turn into a man that would garner the respect and admiration of others. 

So, for now, I'll be patient. Keep these thoughts to myself, mostly for my own sake, but also for Maria's. She cherished the Boy greater than what I thought possible for a Mother. Their relationship recontextualized the one I shared with my own Parents. If I had listened to their advice, where would we be by now? 

Nowhere near as close with our son as we were. 

And as we shared in this blissful transience, the peace I had grown accustomed to for so long began to crumble away in a decisive moment I would regret for the rest of my life.